Senior Director of Commercial and Legal Affairs

This is a fully remote position, open to applicants in United States.

📋 Description

• Lead and manage Backblaze’s legal functions related to commercial, privacy, and product matters.

• Act as a strategic partner across Sales, Product, Engineering, Security, and Compliance teams.

• Direct commercial contracting and take ownership of complex, high-value, and strategic agreements.

• Draft, review, and negotiate enterprise SaaS contracts, MSAs, SOWs, partnership and channel agreements, reseller agreements, professional services contracts, consulting agreements, and associated technology transactions.

• Offer strategic advice on intricate or high-risk negotiations.

• Provide guidance on global privacy and data protection issues, including GDPR and CCPA compliance.

• Oversee data protection agreements, privacy clauses, and related contractual frameworks.

• Advise Product and Engineering teams concerning product design, feature development, and launches.

• Counsel on data utilization, AI and machine learning, intellectual property, open source, and regulatory issues related to products.

• Provide advice on commercial, privacy, and contractual aspects for AI features and AI-driven workloads.

• Create and enhance commercial playbooks, templates, policies, and negotiation frameworks.

• Streamline contracting processes, including the implementation of AI-enabled contracting and legal tools.

• Collaborate with Legal Operations to improve tools, workflows, and reporting mechanisms.

• Deliver training and guidance on best practices for contracting, privacy obligations, and risk management.

• Lead, manage, mentor, coach, and develop legal professionals.

• Establish priorities, allocate tasks, and assist in team planning, resource allocation, and process enhancements.

• Report directly to the Head of Legal & Compliance.

⛳️ Requirements

• J.D. degree and active U.S. bar membership in good standing.

• A minimum of 10 years of relevant legal experience.

• Extensive experience negotiating and leading complex technology transactions, including enterprise SaaS agreements and strategic partnerships.

• Significant in-house legal experience, ideally at a high-growth technology or SaaS firm.

• Strong background in supporting enterprise sales initiatives, partner and channel relationships, and global commercial operations.

• Working knowledge of global privacy and data protection regulations.

• Experience advising on data protection responsibilities in commercial agreements and product offerings.

• Proven ability to provide practical legal counsel to product and engineering teams throughout the product development lifecycle.

• Familiarity with, or a strong willingness to develop expertise in, AI and its legal, privacy, and commercial implications.

• Comfort in utilizing AI tools to enhance work efficiency.

• Prior experience in managing, mentoring, or developing legal team members, or demonstrated readiness for people management responsibilities.

• Exceptional business judgment and ability to handle competing priorities.

• Proven capability to lead, influence, and collaborate across functions and various levels of seniority.

• Excellent communication skills, both clear and effective.

• A hands-on, pragmatic, and solutions-oriented approach with a strong sense of ownership and accountability.

🏝️ Benefits

• Excellent healthcare benefits, covering 100% of healthcare premiums for family.

• Competitive salary structure.

• 401K matching contributions.

• RSU equity awards.

• Flexible vacation policy.

• Maternity and paternity leave.

• Provision of a MacBook Pro for work along with a generous stipend for personalizing your workstation.

• Childcare bonus available.

• Commuter benefits provided.

• A culture that promotes a healthy work-life balance.